CEO holds high-level meet with all EROs
Separate revision in rolls for Panchayat polls likely
Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, May 11: As Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) PK Pole today held high-level review of Special Summary Revision (SSR) of electoral rolls and other arrangements, the Government is gearing up for conduct of Panchayat and Municipal elections in Jammu and Kashmir in October-November as five-year terms of the bodies is ending between November 5, 2023 to January 9, 2024.
Official sources told the Excelsior that the CEO reviewed arrangement with all Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) of Jammu and Kashmir through video conferencing this evening with particular reference to ongoing Special Summary Revision of electoral rolls.
Final rolls are scheduled to be published on May 27 while timeline for filing claims and objections expired on May 6. Now, claims and objections will be disposed of on May 15 while checking of Health Parameters and obtaining Commission’s permission for final publication and updating database and printing of supplements will take place on May 22.
Sources said the CEO took detailed feedback from all EROs on Special Summary Revision and various other aspects of arrangements.
The meeting lasted over two hours, they added.
As per the sources, further extension of timeline for publication of electoral rolls is now ruled out as all the Deputy Commissioners have reportedly completed all formalities.
Meanwhile, as per the sources, the Government is now slowly gearing up for conduct of Panchayat and Urban Local Bodies elections in October-November. However, a formal discussion on them will take place after completion of G20 pre-summit on Tourism Working Group in Srinagar from May 22-24 but an announcement is expected after completion of two-month long annual pilgrimage of Shri Amarnath Ji on August 31.
Sources pointed out that term of Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) will complete on November 5 and that of Jammu Municipal Corporation (JMC) on November 14 while terms of all Councils and Committees in Jammu and Kashmir will end between October-November.
Five-year term of the Panchayats will end on January 9, 2024.
Term of Urban Local Bodies is counted from the day of their first meeting while that of Panchayats is taken into account the day they were constituted.
“In such a scenario, elections to Urban Local Bodies are required to be completed before the end of October and that of Panchayats in middle of December this year,” sources said.
Term of the Block Development Councils (BDCs) will end in October 2024 while the District Development Councils (DDCs) will complete their tenure in January 2026.
“Generally elections to all three tiers of Panchayati Raj System are held simultaneously. However, since elections to DDCs were held for first time in Jammu and Kashmir, there was gap of two years in their and Panchayats term while there was an year’s difference in Panchayats and BDC term,” sources said.
Parliament elections are also scheduled to be held in Jammu and Kashmir along with the country in April-May 2024.
Sources said the Jammu and Kashmir Government will take a decision after taking security situation and other arrangements in consideration on when to hold the elections. A call is expected only after completion of Shri Amarnath Ji pilgrimage on August 31.
“As per the procedure, separate revision in the electoral rolls has to be carried out for Panchayat polls while for Urban Local Bodies, the rolls can be extracted from the general Summary Revision,” sources said.
They added that separate revision for Panchayat elections is necessary as there are very small Panch constituencies and shifting of even one house from one Ward to another leads to objections. Therefore, separate revision will be carried out for the Panchayat polls.
Number of electorates in Jammu and Kashmir had gone up to 83.59 lakh when Special Summary Revision was carried out last year and final electoral rolls were published on November 25. The numbers could further go up when final rolls will be published on May 27.
However, for Urban Local Bodies, the Summary Revision Rolls will be the basic rolls but they will be put in domain for corrections and objections for Corporations, Councils and Committees.
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